


Embarrassment

by Wallwalker



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Comedy, Community: fic_on_demand, M/M, Pre-Canon, Snark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-04
Updated: 2009-12-04
Packaged: 2017-10-04 04:06:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wallwalker/pseuds/Wallwalker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Reeve comes back from a board meeting and finds Rufus at his desk, which is most definitely not where Rufus is supposed to be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Embarrassment

Reeve had a lot on his mind that morning.

This, in and of itself, wasn't too unusual. He always had a lot on his mind, between the President's unreasonable energy demands, the populace's unreasonable energy demands, and the constant infighting among his fellow board members that made focusing on any given topic impossible. In fact, Reeve usually left his board meetings in a preoccupied haze, trying to sort things out in his head, figure out which ones he didn't need to take seriously and which ones he should actually be concerned about.

When Reeve was preoccupied, the only thing that did him any good at all was the simple act of sitting at his desk and thinking. It always soothed his mind, to be surrounded by familiar things and away from the constant Shinra infighting. Needless to say, he was far too preoccupied not to be terribly startled when he walked into his office and found someone else already there.

The man was a stranger to Reeve on a personal basis, but of course he knew who he was; he knew the Vice-President by reputation, if nothing else, although precious little of his reputation was based on anything that could be confirmed. The young man was sitting casually at Reeve's desk, an unmarked yellow folder sitting open in front of him. The folder was full of papers - a closer inspection revealed them to be plans for the city's auxiliary Mako Reactors. He was sitting there browsing the papers, humming very quietly to himself.

Reeve waited for Rufus to acknowledge him, to make some comment about having taken his seat, anything. But the seconds dragged by, and when Rufus said nothing, Reeve sighed to himself and cleared his throat. "Excuse me," he said.

"Just a minute," Rufus said. He sounded vaguely petulant. "I'm thinking."

Reeve lapsed into an uncomfortable silence, not wanting to cause any real trouble. As tough as Reeve could be with his contractors and employees, he just did not know how to deal with the company authorities, especially after having to put up with the President's greed for so long. If the son was anything like the father, well, he was likely to fire Reeve out of pure spite. And Reeve knew that if he was fired, there wouldn't be anyone looking out for the common citizens of Shinra, the ones who didn't donate enough to the company every year to buy whatever policies they wanted. He put up with a lot, but he told himself that if he could help even a few of them, it was worth it. This was just another thing that he had to tolerate for a while...

He knew only a few things about Rufus, about as much as anyone else in the company knew. He was the President's only son; his mother had died of a slow wasting sickness shortly after the boy had reached puberty. But despite his rank as Vice-President of the entire corporation, hardly anyone had ever seen Rufus, let alone spoken to him face-to-face. The President kept him locked up in a location he wouldn't disclose to anyone, presumably because he didn't want his Vice-President and son assassinated.

None of that knowledge had given Reeve the impression that Rufus might one day pop into his office when he wasn't around, commandeer his chair, and then just sit there and read his files. Unfortunately, this meant that Reeve had no idea how to deal with this situation, except to do what Rufus had just told him to do, and wait for a minute. So he stayed very quiet, and watched Rufus study.

"Aren't you going to ask me what I'm doing here, Reeve?" Rufus finally asked, without looking up.

"I thought you told me to wait," he said.

Rufus smirked, still without looking at Reeve. "You're obedient," he said. "I'm sure my father appreciates _that_ side of your personality."

Reeve felt his cheeks start to burn, and he didn't know exactly why. It was the whole bloody situation, he thought. "So," he said, "what _are_ you doing here, Mr. Vice-President?" He deliberately ignored Rufus's dig at him, because he had no idea what to say about it.

"Call me Rufus," he said shortly. "That title makes me sound like one of those old men who are always fawning over my father."

"Yes, Sir. Rufus, I mean," Reeve corrected hastily.

"That's better." Rufus looked up and smiled a bit. "I get bored easily, you see. Father's given me a very comfortable little prison, but he's neglected to give me anything worthwhile to _do._"

"So you decided to break out and go through my files?" Reeve said.

"More or less." He looked back down at the folder. "I knew you had to be good when I asked my father about you. He couldn't find a single nice thing to say."

"That doesn't seem like much of an endorsement -"

"Don't be ridiculous. It's the very best one there is. When my father has a kind word to say about someone, that person isn't worth knowing." Rufus chuckled a bit to himself. "Maybe I'm biased, though. He can't think of a civil thing to say about _me,_ either. That's part of the reason he keeps me locked up."

"Oh," Reeve said. He walked over to his desk, stood behind it. Rufus didn't object; he actually pushed the folder over a bit so that Reeve could see what he was looking at more clearly. Very considerate of him, except for the fact that he was _still_ sitting in Reeve's chair. "So," he said, "what do you think?"

"Not bad. You have talent. Makes me wonder who picked you out while my old man was sleeping." Rufus smiled sardonically at his own joke as Reeve blushed yet again. Then he snatched a mechanical pencil out of Reeve's plastic pencil can, and tore a piece of Shinra letterhead off of an underused notepad. "Still, if I had been in charge of designing these, I would've made a few small alterations."

He began to sketch what looked like a design for the reactor's waste elimination systems, similar to the ones that Reeve knew by heart, but then subtly different on second glance. The boy seemed to know exactly what he was doing, almost as if he was actually an -

"You're an engineer?" Reeve asked as the flash of insight finally struck him.

"No, not officially. I don't have the degree yet." Rufus didn't even look up from the paper as he spoke. He idly pushed a lock of reddish-blond hair out of his eyes as he drew. "But my father has spared no expense at my education, so of course I'm supposed to know _everything._ That way, when the need for another educated minion finally outweighs the embarrassment he feels for fathering me, he can bring me onto the board to fix his mistakes."

Reeve blinked. "Why would your father be embarrassed of you?" he asked mildly.

Rufus smiled sourly. "Why would any father be embarrassed of his own son?"

It did not sound like a rhetorical question, but Reeve did not have an answer. He just shook his head.

"Oh, come now," Rufus said as he finished up his drawing. "Don't be naive. So, how about this, Director?" He pushed the paper over to Reeve, who picked it up and examined it closely.

"Well," Reeve finally said, after much staring and puzzlement, "it would work, but the cost -"

"What cost? It would save the company millions each year," Rufus interjected.

"It would also pump toxins into the slums! The death rate would double if we used this sort of system."

"Yes, right, the precious slumdwellers." Rufus spat the word at him. "I'd forgotten that it was you who cared so much about them."

Reeve stared at Rufus in frank disbelief.

"It seems pointless to worry about them," he continued. "Culling a few of them would do the city good. The slumdwellers contribute so little to the city's upkeep, and it seems that every week another terrorist group rises from their midst. They bite the hands that feed them."

"Not all of them," Reeve protested weakly. "There are _good_ people down there-"

"Hmph." Rufus shrugged. "Well, it hardly matters. Even if I showed it to my father, I'm sure that he'd refuse to change anything, just to spite me. With all of the training he gives me, he can't seem to stand the thought of me _using_ it for any practical purpose."

"Even though it would save him millions?"

"Of course. Because he's ashamed of me." He shook his head. "You still haven't tried to guess the reason behind that, I notice. Aren't you going to try, at least? Don't you have an inkling?"

"No," Reeve admitted. "I really don't know."

Rufus rolled his eyes and stood up, brushing off his white coat. He was standing very close to Reeve now, close enough that Reeve could smell his cologne, something clean and citrusy. "It's not that complicated. What could you have done when you were a young man that would've made your father too embarrassed to acknowledge you?"

"I really don't know," Reeve said, and it was mostly true. "My father died when I was a child."

"Ah," Rufus said. "Then maybe you really _don't_ know. I thought that you were being deliberately obtuse."

"Why would I do that?" Reeve asked, beyond surprise; there had been too many of them to let one more bother him that much.

"To spare my feelings, or because you were afraid someone was watching." He let his gaze linger on the cameras before continuing. "I'd already disabled them, of course - another part of my education. And as for my feelings... I don't feel any shame about it at all. But then, I'm not the closed-minded fool that my father is."

"I... I wouldn't go that far," Reeve said. Something was nagging at him, and he was doing his best to ignore it.

"Why not? Like I said, the cameras are disabled. And my father _is_ an old bigot." He turned and looked Reeve in the face. "Come on. Two guesses, then I show you."

"Show me?" Reeve echoed?

"Yes, show you. Now hurry up and guess."

Reeve swallowed hard. He seemed to be trapped in this game, his face was bright red, and he had no idea what he was supposed to do about it. "Um," he said, "you... you look too much like your mother."

Rufus raised an eyebrow. "Close," he said, "very close. But not quite."

Reeve had more than an inkling, now, of what Rufus might want to show him. He didn't know what to do about it - there was a complaint procedure, a supposedly confidential one, but Reeve wasn't sure he believed it. And he wasn't even sure that he wanted to report it, strange as it seemed. "This is... very unprofessional," he managed.

"It certainly is. But you looked like you needed a break anyway." Rufus reached down and smoothed Reeve's jacket. "So?"

"Ah... he doesn't approve of your... your plans for the company?"

"Of course he doesn't. Not what I was looking for this time, though." Rufus leaned closer to Reeve, started to close the gap between them. "Well, a promise is a promise," he said, and Reeve's heart started pounding even harder -

Someone cleared his throat in Reeve's doorway, making the sort of sound that people who were fond of not having broken bones couldn't afford to ignore. Reeve and Rufus both looked up immediately. "You again?" Rufus asked as he saw the interloper. "I thought that they would send someone more interesting."

"Sorry, Mr. Vice-President. Tseng is still unhappy about what happened last time." Rude smelled like half-smoked cigarettes and quiet menace. It hit Reeve like a punch in the face, especially after the pleasant tang of Rufus's cologne. "Reno did ask me to say hello, though."

"I'm sure he did." Rufus stepped back around the desk; Reeve forced himself to relax. "So, I suppose you're here to escort me back home."

Rude nodded. "Looks like you two have had all the fun you can handle," he deadpanned. The flat tone of his voice made Reeve turn even redder; once again, he hated the fact that he'd always been a blusher. "I'm sure that the Director has more important things to do."

"I doubt it." Rufus grinned at his own joke, then abruptly sobered. "Your boss will be unhappy with me again, I'm sure."

"You'll have to bribe him with that trick you pulled on the cameras," Rude said mildly.

"What, and give away _all_ of my secrets? You must be joking."

Rude shrugged. "It's your funeral."

"Yes, I suppose it is." Rufus turned and gave Reeve another _look._ "Well, it looks as though this conversation will have to wait for another time," he said mildly. "I'll call you whenever my _very_ busy schedule opens up."

Reeve nodded curtly and tried to call back some small shred of dignity as the two men left his office. Then he gave up the fight and flopped back into his chair, and buried his face in his hands. He didn't know what he'd done to turn the universe against him that morning, he thought to himself, but damn it, he was sorry already.


End file.
